


When the Memories First Came Back

by tehfanglyfish



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, And Gwaine and Percival, As Do Arthur and Merlin, F/M, Gwen Gets Her Happy Ending, M/M, Misbehaving Vending Machines, Past Gwen/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin), mentions of Gwen/Lancelot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-07
Updated: 2019-09-07
Packaged: 2020-10-11 15:09:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,663
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20548196
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tehfanglyfish/pseuds/tehfanglyfish
Summary: When the memories of Camelot first resurfaced, Gwen thought she was losing her sanity until she started finding people from her past. And in her moment of greatest need, a long-lost knight showed up to save her.___________________________________Written for the love of Camelot and never for money.





	When the Memories First Came Back

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lilyjamesbond](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lilyjamesbond/gifts).

When the memories first came back, Gwen feared she was losing her mind.

For a few weeks she’d been dreaming of another life. One with knights and a castle and a golden-haired king. She’d chalked it up to her vivid imagination and one too many romance novels at bedtime when her role in the dreams shifted from maidservant to queen. The dreams had been a fun indulgence, nothing overly troubling. Until they started creeping into her waking hours as well.

She was at the hospital where she worked, finishing up her shift. One minute she was completing her rounds on the pediatric wing, the next she found herself wandering the corridors of Camelot, florescent lights and linoleum tiles replaced with torches and stone floors. It had only lasted a moment, but it had felt so real and so familiar, almost like going home. Was she supposed to be changing sheets, going to a council meeting, or checking her last patient of the night? It was hard to say, with multiple lives intertwined and overlapping.

She brought it up the next day with a fellow doctor, who suggested she take some time off. It made sense. Since her father had died the previous year, she’d been taking on extra shifts to avoid the heartache and loneliness that had plagued her. Maybe she was just overworked.

A week away from work left her body rested but did nothing to stop her mind from being flooded with memories of a past life she couldn’t possibly have lived. Rather than fading, the visions grew stronger. Arthur, Merlin, Morgana, Lancelot, Elyan. Her imagination was getting very creative with the names and the plot. There was a dragon, and magic - she’d even been enchanted into trying to kill her husband.

As the memories grew more vivid, Gwen wasn’t sure if she should call a psychiatrist or a literary agent.

And then she saw him. She had just paid for her groceries and was about to leave the shop when she got distracted by a man coming in, talking into his mobile phone.

“You dollophead, I told you that you couldn’t put the dish soap in the clothes washer. Shh… don’t worry about it. Just turn it off until I get home. I’ll be there in a few…”

“Merlin!” Gwen hadn’t meant to shout. She felt mortified as several shoppers turned to stare at her.

The man on the phone fell silent, staring at her wide-eyed. 

I really am going mental, she thought as he pulled her into a tight hug. A random stranger that I remember from a dream is squeezing the life out of me, and my bread, and I’m not even bothered. In fact, I rather like it.

“Gwen! Oh my god, Gwen. It’s you. Arthur, it’s Gwen. I found her.”

Somehow through it all he managed not to drop his phone. She could hear a familiar voice saying something in response. Arthur! Her husband, who apparently had not been a hallucination after all. 

A few hours later she found herself slightly tipsy, drinking wine on the sofa in the house Merlin and Arthur shared. She sat in the middle, Merlin on her left and Arthur on her right.

“You’re a doctor?” Arthur sounded genuinely impressed.

“I wanted to help people.”

“It makes sense, considering how often you stepped in to help Gaius.”

After she’d filled them in on her relatively normal life, Merlin told her about what had happened to him after the battle at Camlann. 

“And you’re immortal?” she asked Merlin when he finished his tale.

“So it would seem.”

Why did you never come home?”

“It hurt too much to think of Camelot without him.”  
  
Gwen could understand that. She distinctly remembered just how lonely those stone hallways felt after she’d lost so many of the ones she loved. Without thinking, she reached out a hand to hold Merlin’s.

“And you’re…?” She wasn’t quite sure what Arthur was, the excitement and the wine clouding her ability to comprehend what Merlin had told her.

“Back,” Arthur said simply, smiling at her in a way she hadn’t even known she’d missed. 

“Are you immortal, too?”

Arthur pondered this and looked to Merlin.

“Honestly, I don’t know,” Merlin told her. “The magic that restored him was powerful. I can feel its effects. He’s not aging.”

She considered this, then decided she’d rather not. Gwen distinctly remembered her own childhood in the modern world - she hadn’t been resurrected like Arthur had been and was likely very much a mortal. She sincerely hoped that the fates would let Merlin keep Arthur this time rather than force him to spend countless centuries alone in the future.

“And the two of you are... together?” This was an area she was better equipped to understand, and one that was far more pleasant to think about.

Suddenly the mood of the room shifted, the pair of them both avoiding her eyes, almost as if they were ashamed.

“Until I saw you today, I thought Arthur was the only person left from Camelot. I didn’t realize that there might be others,” Merlin explained.

“Guinevere, I want you to know that when we were married, I never…” Arthur began.

“I’m very happy for you both,” she cut in before he could go any further.

When they had all been together in Camelot, she’d known that Arthur and Merlin’s relationship went beyond the typical bond between a king and a servant, but at the time it hadn’t occurred to her that two men could be together like _that. _Now, looking back on them with a more modern perspective, she was a little frustrated with herself that she hadn’t figured it out all those centuries ago. The constant glances, the unspoken conversations, Arthur’s hesitancy with her… now it all made sense.

“You are?” Arthur sounded stunned.

“Of course. I’m glad you can finally be together. As you should have been.”

Merlin gave her a kind smile and then she found herself again pulled into a tight hug, Arthur piling on as well. For the first time that Gwen could remember in a very long time, she felt content. They insisted she stay the night, tucking her in with them in the king size bed they shared.

“We’ll let you go tomorrow,” Merlin said. “We promise.”

“Maybe,” Arthur added. His snoring didn’t even bother her – in its own way, it felt like home. Some things never changed, she supposed.

Soon Gwen was back to work, no longer fearful that her sanity was failing. She still worked hard, too much her colleagues told her, but it didn’t really drain her. 

Most of her nights off for the next two months were spent with Arthur and Merlin, alternating between their house and her flat. They cooked her dinner and she caught them up on pop culture. Despite his long life, Merlin had limited familiarity with television and movies, too many of his years spent waiting on a lonely lakeshore for his king to return.

Part of Gwen wondered if the rest of her Camelot family was out there, waiting to be found, doubting their own sanity. It didn’t take long for her to get her answer.

One night at work she heard talking from a patient’s room long after visiting hours were over. She was going in to chase off the stowaway when she realized that she recognized the voice.

“Gwaine.”

The man sitting in the bedside chair turned to face her.

Of course he would still flip his hair like that.

“Guinevere.” He turned pale and she wondered if he was about to pass out. 

The patient, a young girl recovering from a car crash, looked between them. 

“Dr. Smith? Mr. Greene? Is everything alright?”

“Everything’s fine,” Gwen tried to reassure her. “Mr. Greene and I used to know each other a long time ago. We haven’t seen each other in ages.”

“I’m representing her mother in a custody hearing,” Gwaine explained later on when Gwen’s shift had ended. They were in a restaurant popular with hospital staff because it never closed. “She’s trying to get sole custody because the father has been abusive and negligent. He was drunk when he wrecked the car.”

They sat there until dawn, drinking coffee and talking about their lives in the present. It had been Gwaine’s father’s dying wish that that his son study law.

“He left me a sizeable inheritance, so I’m able to take some cases for free. It feels good to still be fighting monsters,” he told her.

As it turned out, Gwen wasn’t the first person from Camelot he’d found. Percival ran a gym and when Gwaine had gone in to set up a membership, they instantly remembered each other, as well as a mutual attraction they’d put on hold when tensions with Morgana had escalated.

“Percival and I, we, um… we’re engaged.”

Gwen beamed at him. 

“You’ll have to bring him to my place on Friday. Merlin and Arthur will be there and…”

“You found Merlin and Arthur?”

“About two months ago.”

“So are you and Arthur…”

“Oh no. They’re together now.”

“About damn time,” he said. “No offense, of course.”

For most of her life in the modern world, Gwen hadn’t been one to have much of a social life. She’d been shy as a child, then thrown herself headlong into her studies and eventually her career. Now she found it increasingly rare to have a night alone, as at least one of her four Camelot friends seemed to stop by on any given evening.

Morgana turned up four months after Gwen had found Merlin. She’d been reading the newspaper one morning with breakfast when she saw a familiar face in a photograph accompanying a story about a new domestic violence shelter that was opening in a nearby town.

“Gwen, I don’t know how to tell you how sorry I am for what I did to you.”

They were sitting in Morgana’s office. Gwen had been unable to resist dropping in to see her. 

“It was another lifetime,” Gwen said. “I’m just glad things are better for you now.”

“This time I got Uther’s inheritance,” Morgana said, “and I’m using it for good.”

“You should come for dinner,” Gwen told her after she’d explained about the others. “We’re getting together this weekend.”

“I can’t. Not yet. But soon. I need to talk to everyone alone - try to make up for the past as much as I can.”

“Ok, but just… don’t go disappearing on me. We’re different people now. We shouldn’t let the past determine our future.”

Elyan she found through social media. 

“I want to meet up with you, I do, Gwen. But it’s not a good time. My daughter just turned one and things between me and her mother are a little rocky. If I’m seeing a strange woman, it will wreck things. It’s not like she’ll believe me if I tell her you’re my sister from 1500 years ago.”

He kept his promise to stay in touch with her online, though his messages were infrequent at best. She tried not to be disappointed. At least Elyan had a family of his own now. 

And then she found Lancelot.

Apparently Percival’s gym had a way of attracting knights lost in time, as Lancelot, now called Lance, had found his way there as well. Gwaine and Percival had brought him along for that week’s shared dinner at Arthur and Merlin’s. As soon as she saw him, all of the love Gwen had held for him flooded back. She felt weak, as though her legs might give out. He was here, she was free - finally they could be together.

For three weeks they had the most intense love affair of her life, past or present. Lance sent flowers to her work, picked her up at the end of her shift, and brought her home to elaborate meals. For twenty-one glorious nights she didn’t sleep alone, Lance making her knees shake and her body tremble as he made love to her.

And then just as suddenly as it began, it ended. She woke up to find him missing, a note on the dresser explaining that he’d enlisted in the military. He knew she’d be angry, but it was something he had to do he said.

“I need to prove myself,” he’d written.

Losing Lancelot for the third time was too much to bear. She called out sick to work, then texted Merlin before breaking down in tears on her kitchen floor. 

“How did you get in?” she asked as Arthur gently helped her to her feet while Merlin packed a bag.

“Magic,” Arthur said as he hugged her close.

She stayed with them for a fortnight, Gwaine and Percival dropping by daily with ice cream and threats of violence should Lance ever show his face again. 

Eventually, though, Gwen was ready to go back to work and back to her flat. And while they wouldn’t admit it to her, Arthur and Merlin really needed time alone. 

“I saw you fidgeting with that small box tucked into your pocket,” she teased Arthur as he drove her home. Secretly, she was shocked at how good of a driver he was when basic household appliances still bested him.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said smiling. “If he says yes, will you be my best man?”

“I’m really not sure how I feel about that wording, but yes.”

Three nights later, Merlin called her to announce their engagement, and their plan for a double wedding with Gwaine and Percival.

It was bittersweet - she was thrilled for her friends. She loved them dearly and they deserved happiness after everything fate had thrown at them - but increasingly Gwen felt empty. She was over Lancelot, this time for good, but her time with him had made her realize just how much she wished there was someone for her to wake up next to each morning. But it seemed that was something fate did not have in store for her.

Gwen was feeling exceptionally alone when she finished up at work that night. It had been a long and demanding day. Part of her just wanted to go home and collapse in her bed, but another part dreaded facing her empty, silent flat.

There was no one to invite over. It was ridiculously late and even if it hadn’t been, the friendships she’d been developing with her co-workers had begun to recede back to professional familiarity once she realized she hadn’t been hallucinating about Camelot. She couldn’t very well share her old life with people in the present. Merlin and Arthur would be celebrating in a way she needed no direct knowledge of. Percival and Gwaine had gone on a holiday and Morgana was still keeping her distance. There would be no one waiting to share dinner with her.

On a whim, she stopped at a vending machine on her way out of the building. This was a night that required chocolate and sugar. As she dug around in her bag for spare change, the new nighttime security guard walked past, stopping to inspect the offerings in the neighboring drink machine. Gwen gave a polite nod but didn’t pay him much attention – she was more preoccupied with her search for coins.

Correct change located, Gwen dropped the coins in the slot and pressed the buttons for her selection. The hospital desperately needed to replace the vending machines – they were ancient. Newer ones took cards. This one would probably be happier if she brought in coins from Camelot.

The machined groaned and whined as it came to life, slowly pushing her chocolate bar toward the edge of the shelf... where of course it got stuck. She waited, hoping that gravity might somehow step in and save her but no luck.

“Great,” Gwen muttered to herself.

She slapped the glass. Nothing. She banged on the side of the machine. No change. She gave the bottom a kick. It still didn’t budge.

On any other day, she might have just cut her losses and walked away. Or maybe she would’ve bought another chocolate bar to dislodge the first. But she was out of coins and this stupid snack was turning into a metaphor for her life.

Oh my god, Gwen thought, I’m going to start crying over a damn chocolate bar.

“Can I help?”

Shit. She’d forgotten the security guard. He probably thought she was a psychiatric patient who’d wandered off when the staff weren’t watching.

He walked over and she wondered if he would try to escort her back upstairs. Instead, he gave the machine a firm shake, freeing Gwen’s chocolate.

“You are officially my savior,” she said as she knelt in front of the machine. “A knight of the highest order.”

Retrieving her prize gave her an excuse to avoid eye contact, allowing her a second to regain her composure. Of course, one could only stay crouched down in front of a vending machine before one appeared strange. Gwen stood up and turned to thank her savior. She found herself looking into a pair of very familiar blue eyes.

“Leon?”

“Guinevere? You’re real? I saw you the other night and I remembered everything. I thought I was losing my mind.”

“Join the club,” she laughed.

“Are… are there others?”

She was about to respond when a couple of nurses approached, lured by the promise of sugar and salt that the vending machine offered.

“There are. And I’ll tell you all about them over dinner. If you want. What time does your shift end?”

“It just did and I’d love to get dinner with you.”

He sounded so eager and earnest that Gwen couldn’t help but blush. The nurses started to whisper and giggle.

“Come on,” Gwen said. “Let’s get out of here.”

They opted for takeaway, deciding it might be best not to publicly discuss their lives from centuries past. Gwen brought him up to speed on recent events, including Merlin and Arthur’s happy news.

“I knew he wasn’t actually teaching the king poetry.”

“What?”

“Never mind. Arthur was, is, an honorable man. I know he would never have… not while you were married.”

That was too intriguing – Gwen demanded he tell her the story, which then led to hours of reminiscing about the past.

“You were so brave after Arthur died,” Leon told her as they sat together on her balcony. “The kingdom could’ve fallen apart but you not only held it together, you made Camelot stronger. I always admired you for that. I served under Uther and Arthur and you, and of the three, you were by far the most capable. And the most beautiful.”

His face turned beet red and Gwen thought she might melt. Arthur and Merlin, Percival and Gwaine – they’d been great to her and she loved them dearly. But three of them hadn’t been around when she’d taken the throne and Percival had been lost in grief. After all those years, to hear someone speak so highly of her, at a time when she’d been shaken with her own loss and insecurity… it was just what she needed after the day she’d had.

She was so overwhelmed with emotion that there was only one logical course of action she could take – she leaned over and kissed him. It was fast and chaste, done with lots of feeling and little thinking.

As she pulled back, they both froze, eyes wide. Gwen knew she should speak, say something, try to clear the air, but no words would come. Panic was beginning to set in. She hadn’t meant to…

And then Leon’s mouth was on hers and it was all ok. More than ok, actually. Closer to perfect if she was honest.

At some point they apparently made it from the balcony to her bed. The particulars of how they got there weren’t important. Gwen had other matters to attend to, as did Leon.

When Gwen woke up the next morning, Leon was still there, arms wrapped around her. She allowed herself a moment of indulgence to enjoy the sensation, then tried to gently extract herself from his grasp. She needed to text Merlin and Gwaine.

Despite her best efforts not to disturb him, Leon began to stir. Instead of letting her go, he held her tight, whispering out a confession he’d never dared to speak in Camelot, even after Gwen had been widowed.

"Arthur wasn’t just my king, he was my friend, as were you. I would never have wanted to put you in a position of having to choose while he was alive. Not that there would have been a choice. Obviously. And then after he died, I didn’t want to dishonor his memory. But Gwen, now that things are different and I have another chance… Guinevere, you’ll always be my queen and if you’ll have me…”

It was too much. She cut him off with a kiss. It was closer to noon when they finally made it out of bed.

“Make it a triple wedding,” she said to Merlin when he finally picked up the phone.

That afternoon, as she sat surrounded by the people she loved the most in the entire world, the rational part of her brain butted in to remind her that things weren’t perfect. Morgana and Elyan were still keeping their distance. Lancelot might one day try to wander back into her life. Who knows – maybe she would welcome him in, though only as a friend and at a guarded distance. And she knew that it would likely be for the best if she and Leon slowed things down, at least a bit. But for the time being, all of that could keep.

Six months before Gwen had feared she was losing her mind, that her sanity was slipping away. She had been lost, and adrift, and alone. But now, for the first time in a very, very long time, Gwen was home.


End file.
